Trump's Impact to Media Bias and Government Accountability with Mandy Connell

Summary

Escaping the Drift: Episode Summary
Title: Trump's Impact on Media Bias and Government Accountability with Mandy Connell
Host/Author: John Gafford

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In this compelling episode of "Escaping the Drift," host John Gafford engages in a robust discussion with Mandy Connell, a seasoned political pundit and radio show host, about former President Donald Trump's recent statements and their implications on media bias and government accountability. The conversation delves deep into Trump's proposed initiatives to dismantle the so-called "deep state," the role of media in shaping public perception, and the broader impact on American democracy.

1. Introduction and Context

The episode kicks off with John Gafford introducing Mandy Connell, highlighting her extensive experience in political research and radio broadcasting. Gafford sets the stage by referencing the recent election and outlining the critical topics to be discussed, emphasizing the significance of Trump's new initiatives aimed at reforming government institutions and addressing media bias.

2. Analyzing Trump's Plan to Dismantle the Deep State

Notable Quote:
Mandy Connell explains, “[...] the bureaucracy of Washington, D.C. is the deep state. When you have people that are fully invested in one party... they are not going to be helpful when you are trying to enact an agenda that flies in the face of their politics.” (09:42)

Trump's plan to "dismantle the deep state" involves a series of actions aimed at removing what he perceives as corrupt bureaucrats within federal agencies. Mandy Connell elaborates on historical instances where agencies like the IRS targeted right-leaning organizations, underscoring the entrenched partisan biases within federal institutions.

Key Points:

• Executive Orders: Trump aims to reissue executive orders to enable the removal of "rogue bureaucrats" and aggressively wield this power.

• Restructuring Intelligence Agencies: Trump proposes overhauling national security and intelligence departments to prevent the persecution of conservatives and other political adversaries.

Connell expresses skepticism about the feasibility of these initiatives, pointing out the likelihood of ideological capture regardless of personnel changes. She emphasizes the systemic issues within Washington's bureaucracy that protect institutional interests over partisan agendas.

3. Media Bias and Its Influence on Public Perception

Notable Quote:
Connell states, “...the media is hemorrhaging money, they are hemorrhaging ratings, they're hemorrhaging a lot of stuff. Newspapers are down to nothing, but they've done it to themselves.” (48:25)

The discussion shifts to the role of the mainstream media, with Connell criticizing its pervasive bias and lack of ideological diversity. She argues that the media's alignment with the Democratic Party has led to a one-sided portrayal of political events, alienating a significant portion of the American populace.

Key Points:

• Echo Chambers: Connell highlights the lack of ideological diversity in newsrooms, leading to echo chambers that reinforce specific viewpoints.

• Media Decline: She notes the decline in newspaper circulation and overall media trust, attributing it to the media's inability to fairly represent all sides of political discourse.

• Misleading Narratives: The episode touches on how the media has perpetuated false narratives, such as the handling of the Hunter Biden laptop story, to undermine political opponents.

4. Election Analysis and Democratic Failures

Notable Quote:
Connell critiques the Democratic strategy, saying, “They ran a campaign that focused far too much on the attitudes, desires, and thoughts of the very liberal intelligentsia elite... Nobody wants to be scolded.” (43:03)

Connell analyzes the recent election, attributing the Democrats' loss to their failure to engage with the broader electorate. She argues that the focus on elite liberal agendas and negative campaigning alienated key voter demographics, particularly Gen X and the working class.

Key Points:

• Negative Campaigning: The use of disparaging language and misleading information by Democrats damaged their credibility and voter trust.

• Disconnected Strategies: Connell points out that strategies catering only to liberal elites ignored the concerns of average Americans, leading to voter disenchantment.

• Support Shifts: She observes that Trump's appeal to working-class voters and his ability to quickly counter negative media narratives played a crucial role in his electoral success.

5. Government Accountability and Structural Reforms

Notable Quote:
Connell emphasizes, “If Trump decides to try and overturn the constitution and become a dictator, I will pick up my pitchfork and my torch and I'll meet you in D.C.” (50:55)

The conversation returns to Trump's proposed governmental reforms, discussing their potential effectiveness and long-term implications for American democracy. Connell advocates for measures that ensure true accountability and reduce bureaucratic inertia.

Key Points:

• Independent Auditing: Trump’s proposal to establish independent auditing systems aims to monitor intelligence agencies and prevent abuses of power.

• Term Limits: Introducing constitutional amendments to impose term limits on Congress members is highlighted as a strategy to reduce entrenched political power and enhance democratic responsiveness.

• Relocation of Federal Agencies: Moving federal agencies out of Washington, D.C., to more strategically relevant locations is proposed to reduce bureaucratic detachment from the regions they serve.

6. Future Outlook and Closing Thoughts

As the episode wraps up, both hosts reflect on the challenges ahead. Gafford and Connell acknowledge the deep-seated issues within American governance and media but remain cautiously optimistic about the potential for meaningful reforms. They stress the importance of staying informed and engaged to navigate the evolving political landscape.

Notable Quote:
Gafford concludes, “If you support these initiatives, root for the guy (Trump). Because if he wins, we all win. At this point, if he fails, we all fail.” (52:38)

Connell reinforces the need for bipartisan support and vigilance to ensure that governmental reforms benefit all Americans rather than perpetuate partisan divides. The episode underscores the critical intersection of media influence, political accountability, and democratic integrity in shaping the nation's future.

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Key Takeaways:

• Deep State Concerns: Trump's initiatives to dismantle the deep state focus on reducing bureaucratic corruption and partisan bias within federal agencies.

• Media's Role: The media's biased reporting and lack of diversity exacerbate political polarization and undermine public trust.

• Electoral Dynamics: The Democratic Party's missteps in connecting with the broader electorate contributed significantly to recent electoral losses.

• Structural Reforms: Proposals for independent auditing, term limits, and relocation of federal agencies aim to enhance governmental accountability and efficiency.

• Engagement and Vigilance: Staying informed and actively participating in political discourse are essential for fostering a democratic society that serves all its citizens.

This episode provides listeners with a nuanced understanding of the intricate dynamics between political power structures, media influence, and the ongoing struggle for government accountability. Mandy Connell's insights, combined with John Gafford's probing questions, offer a thought-provoking exploration of the challenges and potential solutions facing American democracy today.

Transcript

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[Mandy Connell]

We have half the country that did not vote for Donald Trump, and a good chunk of those people didn't vote for Donald Trump because they've been told for over 10 years now that Donald Trump is a fascist, a dictator. He's literally the second coming of Hitler. Okay? And they've been told this so often and so much that they really, truly believe it. All you have to do is look at all the people sobbing.

[John Gafford]

And now, escaping the Drift, the show designed to get you from where you are to where you want to be. I'm John Gafford, and I have a knack for getting extraordinary achievers to drop their secrets to help you on a path to greatness. So stop drifting along, Escape the Drift. And it's time to start right now. Back again, back again for another episode of the show that gets you from where you are to where you want to be. Like it says in the opening. And man, oh, man, I think we are going where we want to be now. Hopefully you feel that way because there was a big election and I got a banger today. A banger, banger, banger. Because my guest today is phenomenal. Right. Like for all you keyboard warriors that are out there and you watch your clips of your different shows coming down your feed and that's where you get your information and you just know that you're right and you're a keyboard warrior. Well, let me tell you this. When you see the clips from this show come down, please do not argue with them because I promise you are punching out of your league. It is a fight you will not win. This person is the host of the number one rated talk radio show in Denver, Colorado. She is the trainer of gerbil eating cats and she is my sister, the one, the only, the fabulous Mandy Connell.

[Mandy Connell]

Mandy, good to be here. You're not going to let the gerbil thing go ever?

[John Gafford]

No, no, no. I know you trained that cat to eat my gerbil when I was a kid. I know you did it on purpose. And here we are. Yeah. No, you don't get off the hook.

[Mandy Connell]

Well, I do see that you, too are wearing black. Are you also in more than the death of Peanut and Fred the Raccoon?

[John Gafford]

Yes.

[Mandy Connell]

I've been deeply moved by the death of the squirrel right before the election.

[John Gafford]

Wild with the squirrel death.

[Mandy Connell]

Yeah.

[John Gafford]

I mean, it was insane.

[Mandy Connell]

Yeah.

[John Gafford]

Well, I'm so glad you're here. You're randomly. I would love to say that she was coming to see me, but she's not. She came here to see her mother.

[Mandy Connell]

Someone has to.

[John Gafford]

Someone has to cut. Yeah, right. Yeah. Because me terrible son doesn't see her enough. So there you go. We have to import people from out of state to come spend time with her. But I will say this before we get into it, and if you have an adult parent, I'm going to give you the best piece of advice from something that nobody gave me. I came up with this all on my own. I should write a book about this. If you have an older parent, and by older, I mean we'll go 75 plus 70 plus.

[Mandy Connell]

I take a 77. 77. I feel like 77 is where things fell off a little bit.

[John Gafford]

There becomes this moment when your older adult parents. And I think it's because it's all they talk to with their friends, all they want to talk about is their ailments. Right. Oh, God.

[Mandy Connell]

I mean, we're going to start with my sciatica, right?

[John Gafford]

The hip is just. And then I broke my toes. And you call the doctor, and it's just this. And it just. And I would sit there at my mom's house and my eyes would kind of glaze over, just like. I just. I can't hear about this anymore. And then finally, what I said was this. I told her. I said. I said, mom, I go, you're getting older. You're not going to be around forever. And I promise you, at no point after you pass am I ever going to be sitting here going, if I only had five more minutes to hear.

[Mandy Connell]

About the hip, which has been bad.

[John Gafford]

I'm just not going to do it. Right? I'm just not going to do it. I said, however. However. And here's the important part, is the framing. It's all about the framing. I said to her, I go, I am desperately interested, desperately interested in cool, fun stories about our family, my childhood, your childhood, that I might not know. So I said, when I come over here, I want to hear three good stories. Every time I come over. And she looks at me and goes, well, what if they're long stories? And I go, then I'll be here for a long time. And the very first time, you can vouch for this. I go from hearing about broken hips to my crazy grandmother trying to kidnap a baby owl and getting attacked by mama owl on the banks of the Cuyahoga River.

[Mandy Connell]

Last night, we found photographic evidence of the boat, the cabin, the river. We have all of it now.

[John Gafford]

I love that. I love that. So, anyway, do that with your aging parents. I can't wait to go hang out with my mom now to hear more crazy, amazing stories, which I'm sure there will be many. But thank you for coming to town and thank you for doing this. And the main reason I wanted to have you on the show was my sister. It is her job to understand this stuff. She has been a political pundit and a political researcher for the better part now of what, 25 years?

[Mandy Connell]

I have had my own radio show since 2005.

[John Gafford]

Yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

By the way, can I give a little humble brag? I just found out Today I'm approaching 5 million downloads on my podcast.

[John Gafford]

5 million millie, 5 milli.

[Mandy Connell]

I started doing a show before there were podcasts. So just imagine if I had had all those shows to go back to. Yeah.

[John Gafford]

Back in like aught three.

[Mandy Connell]

Days when we had agenda, gentlemen with a large horn that just broadcast the show out of the castle.

[John Gafford]

We started out at that point, but that was it. But, but here's the deal. So now with the election coming through, we got our first big bombshell kind of a deal yesterday, which is this thing came flying down everybody's, Everybody's post yesterday. And if you're, if you're hearing this, this is on Friday. So this has happened on Thursday. So you're going to get this on Tuesday. There you go. But this game flying, I'm thinking, which is Trump's plan to dismantle the deep state. Now, as soon as I heard this, I knew I had to drag my sister on to talk about this because a, there's stuff he said. I don't know what he's talking about. And here's the thing. See, listen, I am a Republican, right. I am willing to say there is shit he just said. I don't understand. I'm not going to immediately assume that all of this is good or bad. I'm not going to assume he is a dictator because of some of the things he said. But I wanted to get some clarification from somebody whose job it is to understand what the fuck he's talking about before I make a decision.

[Mandy Connell]

Well, I will say this. The thing that I'm concerned about, about this list that we're about to go through in detail, and I just said this to you. Yes, we have half the country that did not vote for Donald Trump and a good chunk of Those people didn't vote for Donald Trump because they've been told for over 10 years now that Donald Trump is a fascist, a dictator. He's literally the second coming of Hitler. Okay? And they've been told this so often and so much that they really, truly believe it. All you have to do is look at all the people sobbing over, over an election, a presidential election. They're coming unglued. They don't know how to function. They don't know how to go on with their lives. And the list that we're about to go through, if they have been operating in that information silo that we all have, like people on the hard left have one silo, people on the hard right have the other silo. They have never heard of any of the things that we're about to talk about now. And that's what, what is a little concerning to me because they are going to think, well, obviously this is why this proves he's a dictator without the framework necessary to understand where all this is coming from. So hopefully we can give some framework today.

[John Gafford]

Well, let's jump in, shall we kids? Let's jump in. So here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to, I'm going to play portions of what the President of President Elect said he's going to do and then we're going to talk about it.

[Mandy Connell]

Okay? Right.

[John Gafford]

This is like three minute total. I think there's 12 points total. Some of them, I obviously know what they are and I think they're awesome. Some of them, I'm like Pfizer Court. Don't know what that is. All right, so here we go.

[Donald Trump]

And to dismantle the deep state and reclaim our democracy from Washington corruption once and for all. And corruption it is. First, I will immediately reissue my 2020 executive order restoring the President's authority to remove rogue bureaucrats. And I will wield that power very aggressively. Second.

[John Gafford]

Hang on. So first, power to remove rogue bureaucrats. What is he talking about?

[Mandy Connell]

Okay, so let's go back to. I don't know what year it was, but Lois Lerner overseeing the. The irs. And IRS began targeting right leaning organizations. They were going after the tax, the Tea Party specifically. And they were either not providing the proper tax status or they were threatening to rescind tax status. But only of organizations on the right. And for those of you who are on the left, you may say, oh, no, no, no, they did it to left wing organizations as well. Find me one, okay? Because I have looked, I have used the Google I have gone in the Wayback Machine. I have looked. And specifically the targeting that happened to organizations on the left were organizations on the left that were engaging in malfeasance. Right. They weren't doing it legally, so they had to sort of treat them the same. So you've got Lois Lerner making decisions about who's getting tax exempt status for people on the right. So whatever happened to Lois Lerner? She took another job and still is. She might have retired by now, but she suffered absolutely no punishment for that whatsoever. And there was no clear explanation of why. If she did it by herself or if there was a group of people that decided they were going to go after right wing or organizations. It's stuff like that that's the primary example. But that stuff happens all the time. It happened throughout the Trump administration when you've got an entire sort of infrastructure. And I hate the term the deep state because it's so.

[John Gafford]

It's movies.

[Mandy Connell]

It is movies. It's like a Tom Cruise movies. Yeah, it is. And so what it is is the bureaucracy of Washington, D.C. is the deep state.

[John Gafford]

Yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

Okay. Let me just point this out. I don't know if you've noticed this, but we're still functioning as a country and our president doesn't know where he is after 4pm yeah. So who's running the country? The deep state, the bureaucracy. That's what it is. And when you have people that are fully invested in one party, when so much of the bureaucracy has been captured by the left of the Democratic Party, it stands to reason that they are not going to be helpful when you are trying to enact an agenda that flies in the face of their. Their politics.

[John Gafford]

So by removing. So are we talking about making these elected officials that are running these things? I mean, what are we talking about doing or cabinet positions that whatever party is elected.

[Mandy Connell]

Let me just say this about all of the things that Trump is suggesting or, you know, talking about. We're going to get into the rest of them over the long term. You're going to end up with the same kind of ideological capture. Because when you were in D.C. when you work in D.C. the thing you want is to protect the bureaucracy that pays your pension.

[Donald Trump]

Sure.

[Mandy Connell]

That gives you raises, that does all of those things that is naturally antithetical to the Republican Party.

[John Gafford]

Yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

So eventually, even no matter who you put in, the longer they're in there, you're going to get that ideological capture. So it would be a system that I would prefer where you didn't automatically just kind of roll into a new job if you were found to do something wrong. And I like the fact it's impossible to fire a bureaucrat.

[John Gafford]

Well, it's impossible. I think I like the ide when you. I mean, if you don't. Nobody's talking about. I mean, let's face it, you know, government employee is like a moniker for, like, as soon as somebody says, you know, government employee, you immediately think, inefficient, doesn't give a shit, can't be fired.

[Mandy Connell]

And, you know, that's not always true, and it's a sad way to. To look at it, but there are great government employees doing really good work every single day because they love their job. But we didn't get that reputation for no reason. There's going to be 10 to 15, 20% that is there because they know they're not ever going to be fired and they're never going to do their best work.

[John Gafford]

Okay, cool. Moving on. Point 2.

[Donald Trump]

We will clean out all of the corrupt actors in our national security and intelligence apparatus, and there are plenty of them. The departments and agencies that have been weaponized will be completely overhauled so that faceless bureaucrats will never again be able to target and persecute conservatives, Christians, or the left's political enemies, which they're doing now at a level that nobody can believe even possible.

[John Gafford]

Okay, same thing.

[Mandy Connell]

This one's even bigger for me. This is. I happen to believe that the entire top two layers of the FBI should be fired. Yeah, every. Every single person. I don't care if you had nothing to do with it. Every single person. Scrape it off and hire completely new people to come in and take over the leadership of the FBI, the intelligence organizations. I don't know if you remember this, but 51 ESTEE members passed intelligence organization, signed a letter saying that the Hunter Biden laptop was fake. And then they. I mean, it was such a concerted effort by the sort of upper echelon of the intelligence agencies, but it was so just horribly wrong. It was very Soviet Union, when you get right down to it. It was very much like a KGB operation. And these are the people that hold all the power. These are the people that hold the power to spy on you or me or anybody else in our world.

[John Gafford]

We think you're great here at Escaping the Drift, by the way. I think you're doing a great job. Doing a great job. Doing a great job.

[Mandy Connell]

But people always say, my life, my.

[John Gafford]

Thoughts and feelings of Mandy Connell did not reflect those of the host of the Escaping the Drift.

[Mandy Connell]

People always say, my Life is boring. I'm not doing any. What do I care? Well, what if they decide for some reason, you get to be the patsy on something that you had nothing to do with? And there's an apparatus that exists that can dig into every single thing you've ever looked at on the Internet, every phone call you've ever had, every text message you've ever taken unto. Unfortunately, that's the surveillance state that we live in. And maybe they're not looking at you right now because they don't need to, but maybe you run up against the wrong person at some point and end up in some kind of movie where Will Smith is taking out satellites to keep people from, you know, finding him. It's crazy.

[John Gafford]

I think that's so funny, because I think right now, people on the left will hear that like, he wants to dismantle the FBI. It's like. But he wants to do it to protect you, too. He's trying to protect you.

[Mandy Connell]

Yeah.

[John Gafford]

All right, moving on.

[Donald Trump]

Third, we will totally reform FISA courts, which are so corrupt that the judges seemingly do not care when they are lied to in warrant applications. So many judges have seen so many applications that they know were wrong, or at least they must have known they do nothing about it. They're lied to. Fourth.

[John Gafford]

To. Hang on. So, Third, Pfizer courts, fisa, fisa.

[Mandy Connell]

Fisa. FISA courts are the courts that decide whether or not a warrant to spy on an American citizen will be signed. And during the Trump collusion, Russia collusion investigation, there were FISA requests, FISA warrants that were falsified by the FBI. This is not speculation. We know this to be true. They were falsified by the FBI, and it allowed the FBI to continue spying on people within the Trump campaign after they knew the premise was false. And so the fact that that happened and the underlying data and evidence was so weak and the judges signed them. Any. And when you look at how many FISA warrants the judges turn down, well, you can't. I mean, you can count them on one hand. Right? They're just basically a rubber stamp. So the court is not functioning the way it should. And that. That protection against being spied on as a United States citizen is one that everybody should say, yeah, we should probably tighten that up. We should probably make sure that that can't be weaponized.

[John Gafford]

Like, Bernie Sanders ain't gonna argue with that?

[Mandy Connell]

I don't know. I don't know, John.

[John Gafford]

He's not gonna argue. Yeah. All right, moving on.

[Donald Trump]

Expose the hoaxes and abuses of power that have been tearing our country apart. We will establish a truth and reconciliation commission to declassify and publish all documents on.

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[Donald Trump]

Edu State spying, censorship and corruption. And there are plenty of them. Fifth, we will launch a.

[John Gafford]

So this is the one I think is going to send people. Really?

[Mandy Connell]

Oh, yeah.

[John Gafford]

This is the one where. Because. Because honestly, the first time I heard it, it kind of went, hmm. What is your take on what he just said?

[Mandy Connell]

Hate the name of the commission. Hate it with every fiber of my being. Right. It's like, okay, we're going to have the truth ministry now. No, we're not doing that.

[John Gafford]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

So I hate the name that you could have got it a million different ways. But I would love to see some stuff come out that demonstrates how coordinated some of the efforts I believe have been. I don't think that these are random, sort of completely coincidental instances of reporters finding a scoop somewhere. What's happening is these administrations are leaking but only negative information and even lying. During the Russian collusion investigation, there were so many times when we were told by Representative Adam Schiff, a member of Congress, we have the goods, we have the evidence. Oh, we've got it all. We've got everything and literally nothing.

[John Gafford]

Yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

So one of my big frustrations. Can I have an aside for a moment? Just please.

[John Gafford]

Aside.

[Mandy Connell]

One of my biggest frustrations about this last election cycle, which in. I've now gone through 8, 12, 16 and 20 and 24 as a talk show host. Right?

[John Gafford]

Yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

So this election cycle, I saw more absolute, blatant, made up shit that was not even remotely true. And if I got on the radio as a radio host and said the things they said, I would be fined by the fcc. I would lose my job. I would be fined by the FTC for these violations that were so egregious. I am going to find a politician to run a bill that makes a law that says if you lie about your opponent in an ad, you have to make a donation equal to that ad buy to your opponent's campaign and you have to run the exact same ad by telling people that you lied.

[John Gafford]

So here's the question, because this brings up such an interesting thing and this is where I kind of got the. On that one. And everybody's going to jump on it, which Is like one of the guys in the office, one of the younger guys goes, you know, I hope they come up with a way to, like, find the news for telling, you know, fake stuff and blah, blah, blah. And I said, well, you can't do that.

[Mandy Connell]

Right.

[John Gafford]

He said, why? And I said, because who becomes.

[Mandy Connell]

Who's the decider?

[John Gafford]

Who's the decider of what's true and what's not? I said, you know, they. There's countries that do that. Like China. Like, like China has.

[Mandy Connell]

That is not true. What you just saw with your own eyes.

[Donald Trump]

Yeah, yeah.

[John Gafford]

No, no, no. Yeah. The North Korea has that like, like, you can never do that. You can never have that. That separator now. I think that I do. I like that idea. And hopefully, I think, hopefully we get away from that. Well, because I think it blew up. I think it exploded in the left's face this time. Going that way.

[Mandy Connell]

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, here's a perfect example, though. It's all about parsing the details. It's still going on. Actually. We have a congressional race in Colorado that hasn't been decided yet as of now, but there are ads that said this candidate believes that gay people shouldn't get married. Well, when he was 17 years old, he wrote a letter to the editor that said gay people shouldn't get married. He's now 38 years old and he's been very clear about his change on that issue.

[John Gafford]

Sure.

[Mandy Connell]

If they had said.

[John Gafford]

So now he's a flip flopper.

[Mandy Connell]

If they had said, believed that gay people shouldn't get married, that's true. If he says, believes after he's been out on the campaign trail saying, I don't believe that, now, that's a demonstrable lie in my view. And this is how the ofTC and the FCC work in my industry. Yeah, you know, this is, this is how it works. So they're that persnickety and that obnoxious about coming after normal people that are on the radio. Why aren't politicians held to the same standard?

[John Gafford]

Yeah, I just, I think that the whole democracy will end. Oh, God, the world will fall. I think all of that, that rhetoric is. This is why people are screaming in cards today, because they believe that shit.

[Mandy Connell]

They absolutely do. And this is what I say to everybody, regardless of what you think about Donald Trump, you have to believe in the system. Like, let's. Even in January 6th. Right. January 6th happened, but we still had the transfer of power. Right. This isn't a banana republic. We have so many checks and balances and I don't think the American people are in the mood for a dictator. No, I just don't. I don't think they are. I think this last election really sort of exemplified that. They are sick of the ruling class. They don't want to be talked down to. They don't want to be dictated to. They want somebody who's going to say, you know what? I'm going to make your life easier. I'm going to make it cost less. I care about whether or not your family can eat. And I think to your point, maybe the negative stuff will go out the window, but it works. That's what's so sad.

[John Gafford]

Yeah, I mean, I don't think it's going to work anymore. I think there's, I think there's seismic changes happening in the Democratic Party right now. I think there are certain microphones. Aoc. I think there might. Microphones are getting turned down. You're going to be forced to see the centrists of the party rise back up because they just got to understand, I mean, look at, look at the subtle things happening around the world. Even one day after he got elected, New York City mayor comes out, kills those debit cards for illegals living in those hotels. The day like, hey, Trump's election gave him cover. Yeah, but like, maybe this is batshit crazy that we're doing this.

[Mandy Connell]

Well, see, here's the thing with that particular issue. I think that he's known it was batshit crazy, but he was boxed in because the left is so wedded to the concept of showing how gracious they are while not realizing that people who are born and raised here who can't put food on the table are not really loving to hear that people who walked over the southern border are getting bank cards. So Trump gave him cover to make that happen.

[John Gafford]

Well, that's what Kevin O'Leary said. He said this is a big win for the Democratic Party because now they have the data points to go and say, we can't do this shit anymore. Right. We all know it's crazy. We can't do this. We got to push forward. So let's, let's see what's next on. On the old Trumpsters major crackdown on.

[Donald Trump]

Government leakers who collude with the fake news to deliberately weave false narratives and to subvert our government and our democracy.

[John Gafford]

Okay, who's he, who's he talking about here? Is he talking Edward Snowden or is he talking about your.

[Mandy Connell]

No, he's talking about the guys who are. Because. Because let me tell you what happened during the Russian collusion investigation with the media? You would have one of the members of the Deep state or whatever call the Washington Post and say, hey, we think that this particular thing happened. And then the Washington Post calls and says, we've got a tip that this is happening. And it just became this circle of who was feeding who. And that kind of stuff, especially when they're leaking false information, is incredibly damaging. I actually think that is going to be the hardest one to accomplish because. Because the news media is never going to rat out their sources. They have this very comfortable relationship. And one of the things that I find the most distressing about this election cycle that we just came through was the realization that there is no one in the national media, the mainstream media, whatever you want to call it, nobody's telling the truth. Nobody's telling the truth because they all wanted Democrats to win. And they dropped. They just dropped the disguise and we're all in.

[John Gafford]

What was it? So it was like 95% negative.

[Mandy Connell]

Trump and Kamala Harris probably got, and I'm not exaggerating, $2 billion worth of unearned media. Just the bounce from. And I went to the DNC and everybody was there covering it. It was like a cocktail party with the media at the dnc. It was like old home week. Greeting each other, hugging. I mean, it was very distressing.

[John Gafford]

Nobody was there looking for holes.

[Mandy Connell]

Correct. And if we don't have of the fourth estate, we're screwed. I mean, we're royally screwed. So they got to get it together.

[John Gafford]

Well, we're going to get. We're going to get to some of the stuff that I think he's going to do that might help reestablish some of that possible.

[Donald Trump]

We will press criminal charges. Sixth, we will make every inspector general's office independent and physically separated from the departments they oversee so they do not become the protectors of the deep state. Seventh.

[John Gafford]

Right.

[Mandy Connell]

I don't know why they haven't done that already.

[John Gafford]

Yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

I mean, anybody who says, we're going to have an inspector general, but, oh, by the way, your office is right next door to the guy you might be investigating. That's just dumb. Yeah, I think that's a great idea. I love that idea. I want to make it happen. I just want to know where you get those people. Because auditing government is a little bit different than auditing a business in the extent there's no real profit motive. So you're just basically hoovering in money and shoveling money out.

[John Gafford]

Well, this is why, again, I was talking about why I think Elon Musk's involvement in this is so unbelievably important.

[Mandy Connell]

I'm not saying I want Elon Musk to be my permanent hero, but right now, he kind of is my hero. He's 100%.

[John Gafford]

He's Tony Stark. There's just no question.

[Mandy Connell]

He's an alien. He's clearly not from Tony Stark.

[John Gafford]

But here's my thing. Like, imagine this, right? Because, like. And tell me if I'm wrong, because this is my opinion of how things happen. Let's talk about how the $300 hammer becomes a thing, right?

[Mandy Connell]

$900 toilet seat, whatever it is.

[John Gafford]

So you've got. You got Bill Smith that owns the hammer factory in Bloomingfield, Illinois, and he employs 400 hard workers that are unionized up. And he goes to his senator and says, I need this government contractor. My factory is going to close. And now you're going to have a problem with the unions. And nobody's going to. They're going to get somebody else. They're not going to elect you. So I say, okay, cool. I'm going to help you get this government contract. So the government contract gets got because everybody's. He needs the votes. He wants to make it happy. Bloomfield's good. They're selling 300 hammers, which is stupid, to the government. Here's what happens now. You put Elon Musk in to start looking at some of these things. Now he's going to say, hey, the representative and the senator from Bloomville, Illinois, want you to spend $300 on a fucking hammer. So now all of a sudden, I mean, this is. There are people quaking in every corner of government right now because now he can just go on Twitter and out you like that. And just like, you're going to lose either way. So now I think you're going to have people saying, like, hey, man, I feel bad for your factory. I feel bad for the unions. If I do this, he's going to out me and I'm done anyway. What do you want me to do?

[Mandy Connell]

Yeah, that's exactly how it works. I mean, that's 100%. That's why defense contracts never get canceled, even though they never produce what they're supposed to produce. All of these things are connected and the vast majority of them are political. But we are reaching a point. And I have always been a deficit hawk. This is. I mean, I've had my own show for almost 20 years. I've been talking about government spending and deficit spending for that entire time. We're rapidly approaching a point where we are going to have a debt crisis. And people don't understand here what a debt crisis will do because we all assume the United States of America like we're good for it. Right? I mean, but when we hit that debt crisis point, we don't have money to pay for benefits. We don't have money to pay for $300. Hammer. We either face the prospect of the government printing money, which creates hyperinflation. We can't default on debt. We're too big. It would literally destroy the economy of the world if we defaulted on debt. Especially so we have to have Elon Musk or someone like him go in and take a machete to government spending because we're well past the point where we can like kind of mess around on the edges.

[John Gafford]

I love that. I love that Warren Buffett quote where he says I could fix the deficit in five minutes. Just tell pass a law that says that if the deficit exceeds 3% of GDP that no sitting member of Congress is eligible for reelection.

[Mandy Connell]

Exactly. Problem solved.

[John Gafford]

You would fix it in five minutes.

[Mandy Connell]

In five minutes. But where we are now is we're now spending more on our debt service every year than we're spending on defense, than we're spending on Medicare, that we're spending on Social Security, on our just servicing the debt, just paying debt. And that's unsustainable. And people need to realize that forever. Whatever's quaking right now, we have to bring the size of government spending way down or we're going to bring the whole nation down.

[John Gafford]

Way down. All right, next one.

[Donald Trump]

I will ask Congress to establish an independent auditing system to continually monitor our intelligence agencies to ensure they are not spying on our citizens or running disinformation campaigns against the American people or that they are not spying on someone's campaign like they spied on my campaign. Eighth, we will.

[Mandy Connell]

And how can you argue with any of that?

[John Gafford]

How is anybody on the left right now? I don't. Dude, I don't care if you are a card carrying antifa member. If like, if you are, you're hearing that like, well, maybe it's. Maybe it's a good idea.

[Mandy Connell]

Exactly.

[John Gafford]

Maybe I like that idea.

[Mandy Connell]

Yeah, maybe. But no, they always. But here's the thing.

[John Gafford]

He's fascist, but I like that idea.

[Mandy Connell]

They love people being spied on as long as they're on the other side.

[John Gafford]

Yeah, yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

Just when they come to spy on.

[John Gafford]

The other side because it's the bad people.

[Mandy Connell]

Oh, by the way, any word on Whether or not we're going to pack the court or we're going to do away with the filibuster. I'm just.

[John Gafford]

Yeah, just throwing that out there.

[Mandy Connell]

Okay.

[John Gafford]

I don't know. Let's find out what's next. Let's find out.

[Donald Trump]

Continue the effort launched by the Trump administration to move parts of the sprawling federal bureau to new locations outside the Washington swamp. Just as I moved the Bureau of Land Management to Colorado, as many as 100,000 government positions could be moved out, and I mean immediately, of Washington, to places filled with patriots who love America. And they really do.

[John Gafford]

All right, so you have experience with this because BLM is now located in Colorado. Talk about.

[Mandy Connell]

And that was a huge fight, by the way, because we had a Republican senator who managed to get it. And here's the facts. Like, 78% of all federal land is west of the Mississippi. Yeah, but the Bureau of Land Management, who was managing that land was in Washington, D.C. makes no sense.

[John Gafford]

They handled the Indians.

[Mandy Connell]

No sense. That's the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Totally different.

[John Gafford]

The same way.

[Mandy Connell]

Anyway, so he got it moved out. Then the bureaucracy fought back and the Democrats said, no, we're going to pull it back to D.C. but wrangling back and forth. I believe that the BLM is now in Grand Junction, Colorado. But this is something that I've been advocating for forever.

[John Gafford]

Why is it important?

[Mandy Connell]

It's important because if you want to dismantle the bureaucracy of D.C. because D.C. is a giant cesspool, first of all, every American should go to Washington, D.C. and see all of the museums and all of the memorials and all of that stuff. It will make you so proud to be an American, it's not even funny. But the bureaucracy in D.C. is gross. And they're only interested in what I said before. They want to protect their jobs. They want to protect their status. They want to protect their pensions. That is their main goal. Now, don't get me wrong. Wrong. They're working for the American people. I'm not saying they're all just bureaucrats sitting there. I really don't want that impression out there.

[John Gafford]

Not all bad.

[Mandy Connell]

No, not at all. They're. They're doing hard work. But why shouldn't they? Why shouldn't the Department of Agriculture be in Iowa?

[John Gafford]

Yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

You know, or Kansas or Nebraska. Why shouldn't that be? Why can't we move defense to Washington State where Boeing is a massive, you know, contractor?

[John Gafford]

I mean, it'll make it harder to lobby.

[Mandy Connell]

It will make it incredibly hard to lobby. And that's why I love it. And that's the point, because then you've got to work a little harder to get the right people in front of the right people. But at this stage in the game, with our level of communication, there's no reason to have those, those bureaucracies in Washington, D.C. they need to be closer to the people that they're serving so real people can walk in and say, I have a problem.

[John Gafford]

But even more, but even more importantly, I think what he's trying to say is maybe, maybe the Department of Agriculture should be. Should be, should employ a lot of people that understand agriculture.

[Mandy Connell]

Correct.

[John Gafford]

That maybe grew up on a dairy farm, that grew up in a cornfield, that went to college and now, you know, but understand that industry.

[Mandy Connell]

Industry, yes.

[John Gafford]

Maybe. Maybe that makes more sense.

[Mandy Connell]

And, and this is something I've been at Capella University.

[Capella University Ad]

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[Mandy Connell]

Part about this is you think the bureaucracy will fight against anything. They will fight against. Get that as hard as anything else. Because they don't want to move. That was the BLM issue. They're like, well, we don't want to move. They wanted to stay in D.C. if you've ever been to Grand Junction, Colorado, it is a stunningly beautiful place to live. Like, I'm sorry, you can't tell me that Grand Junction is worse than D.C. but they didn't want to move. They didn't want to uproot their families.

[John Gafford]

Not a lot of Michelin restaurants.

[Mandy Connell]

No, not a. But. But also, I mean, I understand not wanting to uproot your family, but. So they're going to fight hard against that. I'll be shocked if he can get that done.

[John Gafford]

Okay. Okay, next.

[Donald Trump]

Love America. Ninth, I will work to ban federal bureaucrats from taking jobs at the companies they deal with, that they regulate. So they deal with these companies and they regulate these companies, and then they want to take jobs from these companies. Doesn't work that way. Such a public display cannot go on. And it's taking place all the time, like with big pharma. Finally.

[John Gafford]

Man, that. That is. That is magic.

[Mandy Connell]

It's huge. So big there's not even room for an H. It's huge.

[John Gafford]

How many people do you think that work at big pharma corporations at one point or another worked at the fda? What percentage?

[Mandy Connell]

Oh, they go back and forth. They go back and forth. They flip back and forth.

[John Gafford]

Oh, boy.

[Mandy Connell]

They'll dip back and forth because they want to make sure they're. They got a good federal pension. So they'll go back and work for a pharmaceutical company and then come back in and maybe a higher level within the fda. It's. USDA is the same way. Way. The USDA is exactly the same way. I'm sure that there's many more agencies that have that same situation where the same people that are working for the same companies that they are supposed to regulate just happen to be getting hired next year before a big drug comes through or this comes through because of their expertise. As a former member of the drug company, I mean, it's that kind of stuff. I'm fascinated to see how RFK plays in this administration.

[John Gafford]

Well, let's talk about that because I think that, that, you know, like that, like, like this is probably a good time to talk about this because, you know, I told somebody yesterday a lot of what he talked about doing, he won't have to do because it's essentially like taking a howitzer to a knife fight, for example. Do you. I, I believe that the day after the election, there was a meeting with a. On a big mahogany table at General Foods where they're all sitting around going, we got to get red dye number three out of Fruit Loop today.

[Mandy Connell]

Yeah.

[John Gafford]

Because it is not a good look. If the US Government tells you you got to do that, you have three and a half months to figure out how to still save your public perception before they come digging all your shit. I've been poisoning the American public, and all of a sudden you better start playing nice guy fast. Because if they come in and turn it on you, your company's going under.

[Mandy Connell]

I think that. And I'm going to use Big Food, because Big Food is definitely a thing. I think that Big Food believes that they have enough, they have enough juice in D.C. to stop any real significant measures. A couple things have to happen before that's going to take place. You've got to put in place that you can fire bureaucrats. That's got to be the first thing. Then you have to scrape off like the top two levels of these various agencies. Then you have to bring new people up. Then you have to get everybody on board. So we're talking about, I mean, on the outside, like two years before anything really happens. Right. So on the inside, actually, that would be a fast timeline in Washington, D.C. so two years. You got two years. So I think your, your point is a great one.

[John Gafford]

I Think it's bad business, but I.

[Mandy Connell]

Think it's terrible business. But they own everything. So it's kind of like, where are you going to go? You know, not everybody can buy organic. Not everybody can do this, but Big Food owns every food.

[John Gafford]

But let's look back, though, Phil. I mean, the cigarette companies own Big Food.

[Mandy Connell]

Yeah. Oh, yeah, 100%.

[John Gafford]

So they've been. They've gone through this row. They know where this lands. They know where it ends. And I think they're like, well, listen, here's the deal. We couldn't pivot out of. We couldn't pivot our cigarettes to a healthier cigarette. We tried that with the Camel filters back in the 20s. Four out of five doctors say smoke Camel. You know, whatever it was, we tried that. Right. We can't do that again. So now we do have an opportunity to clean up our. We can keep our industry here. We don't have to pivot to another industry.

[Mandy Connell]

Right.

[John Gafford]

So I think. I don't think they wait for the government to come jamming up their throats. And it's like the tariffs, I think the threat of that. Yeah, I think the threat of, like, look at this. There was an article this morning that now the Mexican government is actively intervening with a giant caravan of illegals that are migrating through Mexico, trying to get to America, saying, whoa, whoa, whoa, might want to go back. Well, why hasn't Mexico intervened for the past four years? Oh, it's because the tariff man's here that can crush your economy with one fell swoop.

[Mandy Connell]

Oh, I think it's more than that. I think it is that Trump. One of the things, and I'm going to be perfectly honest, like, I didn't vote for him in the primary, even though he had already pretty much locked it up. I voted for Nikki Haley. I'm not a huge fan. I'm still mad at him for the way he fired you on the Apprentice. Okay. I'm still angry as your sister. I am still mad about that. I mean, I've tried to let it go when I can.

[John Gafford]

Listen, listen. As somebody still in mourning over their gerbil, I understand, I understand, I understand.

[Mandy Connell]

I get it. But one of the things I do like about what he brings to the White House is everybody around the world is pretty sure he's crazy. So that uncertainty on their part makes it impossible for them to do anything aggressive because they think he's crazy.

[John Gafford]

I'm just thinking to myself, like, how many people look him with a passion. He's actually done something to me as A person, actually, in person. He did something. I got the cobra. I got the cobra in person and I still support the guy. I don't know. What are you going to do? What are you going to do?

[Mandy Connell]

In any case, that's, I mean, I like that about him. And I do think that, to your point about the tariffs, I also think that there's going to be manufacturers who are like, crap, oh yeah, what are we doing? How do we make this not happen? So the threat of it is probably going to be enough to prevent or at least move things enough so Trump can say, okay, you know what, that moved the needle enough. I'm okay with that. We're not going to move forward with tariffs.

[John Gafford]

Well, I know you're not an economist, you're a political thing, but what, and you may know this, you may not. What is the trade deficit we have with China?

[Mandy Connell]

Let me just say this. The trade deficit doesn't matter. The trade deficit doesn't matter. Trade from China, like it or not, allows people on the lower end of the socioeconomic spectrum to have things they could otherwise not afford.

[John Gafford]

Yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

So all in all, the trade deficit does two things that are significant. Number one, it puts people out of work in the United States of America. They used to work in a factory making products that are no longer made in the United States of America. That is the downside. But overall, it raises the buying power of people in this country dramatically. Do you really think you'd be able to go to Costco and buy a 40 inch TV for 138 bucks if we were still making it here because we have a higher standard of living?

[John Gafford]

No. And that's one of the things that I, that I grapple with. How are they going to figure this out? Like, how do you bring manufacturing back to the, the States when you're grappling with the union? We're grappling with unionized labor.

[Mandy Connell]

I think automation is a big part of it. I don't think we're ever going to have, you know, Henry Ford style production lines where every single aspect is done by a human being. But if you build a factory, even if it is mostly fully automated with robotics, you've got to hire people to take care of the robotics.

[John Gafford]

Dude, I got, I got a dope. I got a dope idea for a movie. I don't have. I don't have.

[Mandy Connell]

I always come up with these great movies and I always say them on my show.

[John Gafford]

No, no.

[Mandy Connell]

Hoping that someone else will make.

[John Gafford]

Please figure this out. Like, here's, here's My movie. Right. So in the dystopian future.

[Mandy Connell]

Okay, right. Post apocalyptic world.

[John Gafford]

No, not. Well, basically, yeah. But AI is such a thing. It has pretty much replaced every job. So instead of having, you know, they talked about there's going to be a need at some point from Yang to have a national income. So to pay for the national income, they make you work in a factory. But here's the thing. You put a. You put a thing on your head. Head that in like a neural link that interacts with your brain. That's AI that does the work. So you're just kind of standing like a robot, but in your brain you're like, at the beach.

[Mandy Connell]

Oh, shut the front door.

[John Gafford]

Right. So. So your body.

[Mandy Connell]

Sign me up, dude, because you're working out.

[John Gafford]

Yeah, your body, you're at the beach.

[Mandy Connell]

Yeah.

[John Gafford]

Your body's on the plane. But then, of course, then, you know, one guy wakes up and some horrible happened that he was being programmed to do that. He didn't know. And then it's got it. But I keep, I keep, I slide right into minority port right there. And I'm like, ah, it's been done.

[Mandy Connell]

It's been done. Right.

[John Gafford]

In a minority port.

[Mandy Connell]

So anyway, something else.

[John Gafford]

All right, so back to this. What's next?

[Donald Trump]

I will push a constitutional amendment to impose term limits on members of Congress. This is how I will shatter the deep state and restore government that is controlled by the people and for the people. Thank you very much.

[Mandy Connell]

All right, that is going to pass.

[John Gafford]

That's going to pass.

[Mandy Connell]

That is going to pass. And here's the thing. The polling on this, like 75 to 80, everybody wants, Americans want, want.

[John Gafford]

This is where Elon Musk comes in. Like, you want to vote against this, you want to lobby against this? Mr. Congressman, Mr. Senator, I will demolish you.

[Mandy Connell]

Well, I don't even think it's. I think that the problem in getting the states to put up a constitutional amendment is that it requires too much wrangling in different states about language and all of this different stuff. And there are politicians in the legislatures who would not want this to pass because that's all. They all envision that as their future. Right?

[John Gafford]

Sure.

[Mandy Connell]

So it's going to have to come. Trump's going to have to say, we're going to do this. The people have to vote on it. And if you don't like it, then that's a campaign point to be used against you. I think that would be wildly popular. And I am down for it 100%. Yeah, I think, you know, two terms in the Senate. Four terms in the House, max.

[John Gafford]

Yeah, I'm fine with that. 12 years. That's good.

[Mandy Connell]

You know, 12 years is the Senate, and then you have eight more years in the House.

[John Gafford]

So you could do both.

[Mandy Connell]

A total of 20.

[John Gafford]

20. You could do both.

[Mandy Connell]

I'm fine with that.

[John Gafford]

Yeah, you show up at. You show up at 35, you're out at 55.

[Mandy Connell]

Exactly.

[John Gafford]

Okay, I'm fine with that. And not that they're. Not that I'm an ageist, because again, my mom. Owl stories. Magical, hilarious. Love it. She's 80, not ages.

[Mandy Connell]

About turn 81.

[John Gafford]

However, I have an issue with people that the only job they've ever had is to be a beer.

[Mandy Connell]

Correct, Correct. They've never actually created a job. They've never actually paid a payroll. They've never actually made payroll. No, I am with you. I think we need to make opportunities more available for people with real life experience to get in there for all of those things.

[John Gafford]

So based on everything that you heard, let's talk. I mean, this is like, we talked about it a little bit before the show started. When you said he's finally learned, what did you mean by saying that?

[Mandy Connell]

He came in in 2016. And one of the things that I think Donald Trump really underestimated was exactly how well orchestrated the deep state is. I don't think he was ready to have everybody in every department work against him. And he learned something watching the Democrats. I've always actually admired this about Democrats. What the Democrats do so well is when they get into office, they throw everything against the wall at the same time. It's almost impossible to defend against everything at the same time. So by throwing everything, just throwing it all in the pool at the same time, you severely limit the ability to message and demagogue against it because there's so many different things happening.

[John Gafford]

It's a lot.

[Mandy Connell]

So I love all of this. I mean, some of it I think he's going to struggle more with.

[John Gafford]

What do you. Okay, so if you got to pick one of all that stuff, what do you think is the throwaway? What do you think is the shiny objects that can get the stuff done. Done? What do you think the one.

[Mandy Connell]

I think what is most likely, if I was him, I would probably cave on moving all of the agencies out of D.C. to engender a little goodwill with the bureaucracy?

[John Gafford]

Yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

So that would be the one. But then in my, you know, like the next president, I'd be like, yeah, do that. You know, do that. Because that would be incredible. But get Everything else done first and then bust up the bureaucracy.

[John Gafford]

Cool. Well, let's, let just, let's talk just straight up the election. Why do you think the Democrats lost the way they did?

[Mandy Connell]

I've been doing nothing for the past two days except watching MSNBC and cnn. Left wing, hardcore left wing and msnbc.

[John Gafford]

Me too.

[Mandy Connell]

Specifically to see if they learned anything from this. And it's very apparent to me that they learned nothing. What they did was run a campaign that focused far too much on the attitudes, desires and thoughts of the very liberal intelligentsia elite, the college educated white liberals who live in urban centers. And when anybody dared to disagree with him, instead of trying to create a compelling argument, you had Obama out there scolding black men. You have Oprah out there scolding people. Nobody wants to be scolded. And I don't know if you know this, but Gen X actually was the largest chunk for Donald Trump. And somebody said, why is that? I go, because we don't like to be told what to do.

[John Gafford]

Yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

The other part of it is they ran with so many blatant, easily demonstrable falsehoods and people have the Internet and a lot of people were like, wait a minute. I actually looked up what he actually said about Liz Cheney and it was nothing like that. So they got ahead of their skis. They said a lot of things that weren't true. They. And I gotta. Can I just say thank you to Joe Biden and not for what you think.

[John Gafford]

Go ahead.

[Mandy Connell]

Thank you to Joe Biden. Biden for when he got absolutely stabbed in the back like Judith style, I mean, just stabbed in the back.

[John Gafford]

It was Julius Caesar on the Senate floor.

[Mandy Connell]

He immediately turned around and said, and by the way, I endorsed Kamala Harris for vice president. Nobody asked him to do that. He knew she was a terrible candidate. He knew she was probably gonna lose and that's what he wanted. So thank you, Joe Biden.

[John Gafford]

Well, this is the thing that I, this is the thing that's wild to me me was you're going to see. And this is the best part, not the best part, it's actually kind of sad. You're going to see all of these people that are crying in their cars and saying that the only reason she lost is misogyny on the left from.

[Mandy Connell]

The View today where somebody, racism as well.

[John Gafford]

You saw that. Racism, misogyny, it's the only reason that she lost, blah, blah, blah, blah. You're going to see as part of the Democratic Party reset, there's going to be books come out there's going to be lots of leaking that comes out very soon. That they all knew she was an awful candidate. The only reason they did it was because. So they could tap his war chest because there was no way anybody else could raise enough money to go on time, and his money would be off limits.

[Mandy Connell]

I don't know if that. I don't know if that is. It was only $51 million. 51 million. She raised a billion in three months. And that was anti Trump money here. Let's be real. I mean, it was this. I got to go to the RNC and the DNC this year. I covered both of them. What a phenomenal experience. Just so incredibly cool to be able to do that. And everyone at the Democratic National Convention, they just named Kamala Harris. They were so excited because they knew that Joe Biden was gonna lose. They knew it. Everybody knew Joe Biden was gonna lose.

[John Gafford]

It was a Hail Mary.

[Mandy Connell]

And they were literally, like, clinging to her like a life vest.

[John Gafford]

You're our last toast.

[Mandy Connell]

And she just turned into such a disappointment. As a candidate, just across the board, she.

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[Mandy Connell]

Nothing. Right. And I. And I mean that. She had no policy positions to speak of. She was patronizing. She blatantly started stealing Trump's ideas.

[John Gafford]

Yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

And trying to make them her own.

[John Gafford]

The tip. The thing.

[Mandy Connell]

Worst candidate I can remember is Kamala Harris.

[John Gafford]

And honestly just appeared not to be able to do an interview.

[Mandy Connell]

No, I just.

[John Gafford]

At all. I mean, they're like. Like, oh, she was too busy to do Rogan. 48 million views on YouTube for the President.

[Mandy Connell]

Whoever floated that into the media. Hey, Kamala Harris is thinking about doing Joe Rogan. What are you thinking? No, what are you thinking? And I want to give a little credit to this last six weeks of the election cycle. There are going to be classes taught for a century on the last six weeks of the Trump campaign and how he handled it when his supporters were called garbage. And dude rolls up the next day in Green Bay in a garbage truck. I was like, stop right now. The McDonald's thing, I mean, those two things, I think more than anything else are what made working class people go, that's the guy for me.

[John Gafford]

Well, I think, think. And I think when you look at it, how quick the news cycle is. Just for nothing else, the Speed of the news cycle was on full display through this. The dude got there was an attempted assassination.

[Mandy Connell]

It was very former US President and.

[John Gafford]

It was yesterday's news. Like a bad piece of fish sitting outside in the garbage in two days.

[Mandy Connell]

Okay, so not this past week, but the week before the election, Saturday night, a trash comedian gets on stage, makes a comment about Puerto Rico being a floating garbage of island, which by the way, they do have a traumatic, tremendous garbage problem. But whatever, it's fine. That was the news cycle on Sunday. That was a cycle on Monday. Joe Biden calls Trump supporters trash on Tuesday. And by Wednesday. Well, there was an apostrophe there that you just didn't hear.

[John Gafford]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

I mean, this, this the speed with which the media congealed around whatever talking points they needed to congeal around in order to help the Biden Harris campaign was really upsetting to me. I'm telling you, that's my takeaway is that's the worst thing that happened in this campaign.

[John Gafford]

Okay. Do you think that the legacy media sits up and looks and says, maybe America's done with this and starts trying to be better?

[Mandy Connell]

John, they don't think they're biased. I talk to people on ABC News, CBS News, I have these conversations with them on the radio, and they will push back when I say, look, what do you think about the fact that you are now the least popular institution in the United States of America, that Congress has a higher approval rating than you? And they will say, well, it's because the right demonize Trump, demonizes us. I'm like, no, you need to do a little introspection. But the problem is, is that most newsrooms are full of people who think the exact same way. There's no ideological diversity in the newsrooms. They've done great getting black people in newsrooms, Hispanic people in newsrooms. I mean, if you want to be in the newsroom and you're anything but white, you are welcome unless you're conservative. And so everybody looks around and goes, are we biased? And they go, of course not. Do you think we're biased? No, of course not. There's no know they're in an echo chamber. So I, I, what I think is going to happen is that they are hemorrhaging money, they are hemorrhaging ratings, they're hemorrhaging a lot of stuff. Newspapers are down to nothing. Newspapers have nothing left, but they've done it to themselves.

[John Gafford]

Yeah.

[Mandy Connell]

So it's like cry me a river when you refuse to listen to us saying, you know, Treat the other half of the country fairly. That's all. I, I don't need to be. I don't need to have smoke blown up my skirt. Treat me fairly.

[John Gafford]

When you start to look at, you know, one of our case goals is to get, you know, pharmaceutical advertising off of television.

[Mandy Connell]

Yeah, that.

[John Gafford]

I mean, what's left after that? How much? I mean, that's got to be such a massive portion of their budgets.

[Mandy Connell]

Well, insane as I watch a lot of NCIS repeats along with apparently other 70 year old people. That's all there is on.

[John Gafford]

Was Matlock not on.

[Mandy Connell]

Hey, there's a new Matlock with Kathy base. It's very entertaining.

[John Gafford]

Oh, my God. I'm just saying, of course you watch.

[Mandy Connell]

I'm just saying, of course I like Kathy Bates. I can't help it. She's very good in it too. It's got a little. It's edgier than the original Andy Griffith reruns. Is this. There's a new matl.

[John Gafford]

Are you crocheting yet? Are you knitting? What are you.

[Mandy Connell]

I macrame. Thank you. That's fine.

[John Gafford]

Jesus.

[Mandy Connell]

Okay. Anyway, no, I, you know, this election cycle was horrible. What I hope, what I hope is that as Trump does the things that he's trying to do, that the people who are so freaked out on the left, by the way. I am not dunking on any of those people.

[John Gafford]

No, no.

[Mandy Connell]

Because they have been living in a world where they have been sold a bill of goods that is inaccurate and terrifying. But what I hope that they can do is see as things start to progress that their fears are unfounded. And I'm just going to say this. If Trump decides to try and overturn the constitution and become a dictator, I will pick up my pitchfork and my torch and I'll meet you in D.C.

[John Gafford]

I'M right there with you.

[Mandy Connell]

You know I'm right there with you.

[John Gafford]

Yeah. I think, you know, if you're somebody that voted for him and support these things, you can't look to dunk. Like you said, you can't look dunk on the thing.

[Mandy Connell]

It's counterproductive.

[John Gafford]

Like, you know, you see all the nonsense and the stuff now and I'm moving to, you know, I'm moving to Spain. Okay, great. Whatever. You know, he's going to be this. Don't. There's no reason to save their tweets.

[Mandy Connell]

I, I actually did start a drop ship company for handmade sales outfits just in case. So I figured there's an economic opportunity there.

[John Gafford]

Yes.

[Mandy Connell]

To just, you know, easy peasy.

[John Gafford]

They're they're probably, they're probably.

[Mandy Connell]

Handmadalescostumes.com Just stop.

[John Gafford]

Well, speaking of that, if they want to hear more of your genius when it comes to stuff, how do they find find you?

[Mandy Connell]

You can find me the Mandy Connell show on the iHeart media platform or live on 850 KOA94.1FM in Denver, Colorado. But I also have an amazing blog if I could pivot.

[John Gafford]

Yeah, go ahead.

[Mandy Connell]

My blog is amazing. I, I do it five days a week at Mandy's blog dot com. Look for the latest post section and look for the blogs because they're, I, I'm just going to say they're really freaking good.

[John Gafford]

Yeah. And as always, you can find me on track seven of an eight track in a 1967 El Camino in the back of a bar, a parking lot of a bowling alley.

[Mandy Connell]

I just said today I was talking about our star a Star wars, the original Star wars soundtrack. That was an A track.

[John Gafford]

It was on a track, of course, which was kind of crappy because you had to like wait, listen to everything.

[Mandy Connell]

To get to the Cantina song.

[John Gafford]

To get to the Cantina.

[Mandy Connell]

Yeah.

[John Gafford]

That's what you did. Anyway, well, thanks for being here and clearing this up. Hopefully, man, hopefully if you listen to this, you're not enraged by an opinion, like a very educated opinion on what this stuff means. And like everything else, man, you can dislike Donald Trump all you want want, but root for him. Because if he wins, we all win. At this point, if he fails, we all fail. So root for the guy.

[Mandy Connell]

Root for America.

[John Gafford]

Root for America. We'll see you next time. What's up, everybody? Thanks for joining us for another episode of Escaping the Drift. Hope you got a bunch out of it, or at least as much as I did out of it. Anyway, if you want to learn more about the show, you can always go over to escapingthedrift.com you can join our mailing list. But do me a favor, if you wouldn't mind, throw up that five star review. Give us a share. Do something, man. We're here for you. Hopefully you'll be here for us. But anyway, in the meantime, we will see you at the next episode.

[Capella University Ad]

At Capella University. Learning the right skills could make a difference. That's why our business programs teach you relevant skills you can take from the course room to the workplace. A different future is closer than you think with Capella University. Learn more at Capella Edu.